Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Saturday, 20 June 2026 welcomed the release of the 23rd instalment of the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) scheme, under which Prime Minister Narendra Modi transferred more than ₹18,880 crore directly into the bank accounts of over 9.44 crore farmers across the country.

Context

Chouhan took to X to mark the occasion, describing it as 'utsav aur samman ka avsar' — 'a moment of celebration and honour' — for the country's farmers. In his post, he quoted the scale of the disbursement and framed it not merely as financial assistance but as recognition of farmers' labour and contribution to the nation. 'This is not just economic support,' he wrote, 'but respect for the farmer's hard work, dedication, and contribution.'

The transfer was executed through the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) framework, which routes funds straight to beneficiaries' bank accounts, bypassing intermediaries. The 23rd instalment continues the scheme's cadence of three tranches per year, each of ₹2,000, adding up to an annual support of ₹6,000 per eligible farmer family.

Policy Backdrop

PM-KISAN was launched on 24 February 2019 by Prime Minister Modi as a central-sector scheme to provide minimum income support to landholding farmer families. Since its inception, the scheme has become one of the flagship pillars of the government's agricultural welfare architecture, operating alongside programmes for crop insurance, institutional credit, and minimum support price procurement.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, which Chouhan heads, administers the scheme. The consistent release of instalments across successive years has institutionalised direct fiscal transfers as a core instrument of farm-sector policy, with the DBT mechanism credited with reducing leakages compared to earlier subsidy-delivery models.

Stakeholders and Impact

The primary beneficiaries are landholding farmer families registered under the scheme across rural India. With over 9.44 crore accounts receiving funds in this round, the disbursement has a broad reach into the rural economy. Chouhan underlined this multiplier logic in his post, arguing that a prosperous farmer translates into 'happiness in fields, development in villages, and the nation establishing new dimensions of progress.'

The scheme is particularly significant for small and marginal farmers, who constitute the bulk of India's agricultural workforce and for whom the ₹6,000 annual transfer represents meaningful supplemental income during sowing and harvest cycles. Rural households beyond direct farming — those dependent on agricultural wages and local rural commerce — also benefit indirectly as farm incomes rise.

What's Next

With the 23rd instalment now disbursed, attention will turn to any changes in scheme eligibility, beneficiary verification processes, or outlay revisions that may be signalled during the upcoming monsoon session of Parliament or in the next Union Budget. The government has periodically tightened the beneficiary database through e-KYC and land-record linkages to weed out ineligible claimants, a process that could affect the beneficiary count in future instalments.

Chouhan's public acknowledgement of the release — framed around the dignity of farmers rather than just the numbers — signals that the ruling dispensation intends to keep PM-KISAN central to its political and policy messaging ahead of state assembly cycles and the broader rural outreach agenda.